Egypt’s security forces have surrounded Muslim Brotherhood activists and their supporters in a mosque in Cairo, with the Brotherhood saying the siege raises fears of another massacre. ● On Friday night, the security forces besieged the Al-Fath Mosque in the Ramses area where a large number of supporters of ousted President Mohamed Morsi were holed up. The Brotherhood said gunfire has been going on around the mosque for some time, but security officials accused [lied and said] the protesters of shooting at police from inside the mosque.

The National Security Agency has broken privacy rules or overstepped its legal authority thousands of times each year since Congress granted the agency broad new powers in 2008, The Washington Post reported Thursday. ● Most of the infractions involve unauthorized surveillance of Americans or foreign intelligence targets in the United States, both of which are restricted by law and executive order. They range from significant violations of law to typographical errors that resulted in unintended interception of U.S. emails and telephone calls, the Post said, citing an internal audit and other top-secret documents provided it earlier this summer from NSA leaker Edward Snowden, a former systems analyst with the agency.

New revelations of NSA violations stir lawmakers’ concerns, 1 week after Obama’s assurances
James Petras: The Deeper Meaning of Mass Spying in America

The leader of the secret court that is supposed to provide critical oversight of the government’s vast spying programs said that its ability to do so is limited and that it must trust the government to report when it improperly spies on Americans. The chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court said the court lacks the tools to independently verify how often the government’s surveillance breaks the court’s rules that aim to protect Americans’ privacy. Without taking drastic steps, it also cannot check the veracity of the government’s assertions that the violations its staff members report are unintentional mistakes.

■ “The FISC is forced to rely upon the accuracy of the information that is provided to the Court,” its chief, U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton, said in a written statement to The Washington Post. “The FISC does not have the capacity to investigate issues of noncompliance, and in that respect the FISC is in the same position as any other court when it comes to enforcing [government] compliance with its orders.”

● Army sharpshooters lined the rooftops in Ismailia, where protesters shouting “peaceful” filmed one man trying to hold off a tank shot by unidentified snipers. At least seven people were killed and 20 injured in the city. Eight protesters were killed in clashes in Damietta, and protests also took place in Tanta, Fayoum and Assiut. ● The junta is trying to justify the massacre of defenseless protesters, rallying support in the liberal bourgeoisie and sections of the middle class with false claims that the victims were armed terrorists. State TV put a banner in English titled “Egypt Fighting Terrorism” on its coverage of yesterday’s crackdowns. ● The MB has called on its supporters to mount nationwide protests against the junta every day for the next week. ● Popular anger is escalating in Egypt and internationally over the repeated mass killings of protesters by the Egyptian junta and the complicity of Washington. Protests in Egypt are mobilizing forces beyond the right-wing MB’s support base, including layers of urban youth who have clashed with police and army forces since the early days of the Egyptian revolution in 2011 and oppose the army’s re-imposition of emergency rule.